Grimm MU1 Streamer - Really "The Best"?

@grannyring 

I hear you and your sharing of your expeiences has influenced many of my decisions in the past. Thank you! You are always so kind to share what you learn…and to do so over the telephone as well. You are a real asset to all of us.

Your experience with the Phoenix reclocker doesn’t surprise me…but not because it isnt a terrific product, it is. It further reinforces that all products are not additive just because they are sometimes effective in certain situations. A simple example is if product A lowers the noise floor of something by 20% in a noisy system, what that product does well may make no audible difference in another system with a lower noise floor. I think we all to often suspend our decades of well earned logic with some of what we experience in hifi. For instance the reclocker may make a hige difference with average dacs with average clocking on their usb input whereas your dac likely has superior clocking. In short, the Phoenix is addressing something that you dac addresses more effectively. Thats my working theory as to why the Network Acoustics Muon system can be so absolutely transformative when I dropped it into my Innuos Zenith based setup while the Muon setup doesnt enhance the Grimm based setup in the least. In short, there are alot of products that address different things so when someone says its system dependent, what many of us are saying is “we dont know what needs addressing in your system, but in my system I made this change and it enhanced performance”. I read comments alot here on Audiogon that Reviewer A said it did this and I bought the power conditioner and it didnt do squat. Maybe the reviewer is in Brooklyn with bad power and the user who says it did nothing has phenominal power at their home. These subtlties in a system don’t stack like coupons on Amazon. For something to enhance a listening experience, there needs to be something to fix.

Be well Bill.

@grannyring , as I’ve mentioned in past threads For a long time I didn’t hear the benefit of Innuos Sense over Roon that you and pretty much everyone else hears, until fairly recently. Not sure if it was due to a version change in either’s software or another tweak in my system, but I now hear far more detail and better imaging with Sense. Roon still sounds a little “bigger” to me in terms of scale, and also fuller, but Sense is just better.

@ghasley , thanks again for your input. One concern I had was not knowing how decent the AES implementation is on my Diablo 300 DAC, vs USB which I currently use. Sounds like it will work well. I suppose the Diablo DAC’s supercapacitor it uses to provide isolated voltage for USB would not be utilized when using AES? I like that flashing blue light on the front of the Diablo that indicates the super cap is charging, when you haven’t powered the unit in a while!  But it makes me think that Gryphon went the extra mile to make it’s USB interface on the DAC really good.

@nyev

I agree with you that the Diablo is a very well engineered piece. I dont know in what way Gryphon built their board, where or what was optimized for the dac board in general nor their usb implementation in particular. With that said, I cant imagine that the usb to spdif handoff is revolutionary, more likely it was optimized. Therefore, and this is a WAG, the usb to spdif handoff as well as the clocking is more than likely very, very good but its unlikely the clocking is a world beater. The Grimm or the better Aurenders via AES will likely make a material difference.

One of the advantages of a high end company like Gryphon designing their own dac (or phono) board is they can build it to their standards based on the optimal traits to complement the Diablo. No interconnects needed, perfect integration, etc, etc. They dont have to overbuild it, they just build it to a high enough standard and thats where they should logically stop. Its a tremendous value but thats from a long ago, multi day audtition. If you like your Diablo and dont plan on moving up the Gryphon foodchain, you are set. If you are content, then dont overbuy on the server/streamer front.We all get caught up with bringing a howitzer to a pillow fight bu the analogy absolutely applies to hifi.

In your case, assuming you are happy with your Diablo and you just want to enhance/maximize what you have, I believe that the less you ask a dac board to do (even a dac board developed by an exceptional manufacturer like Gryphon) the better off you will be. The aes input will be an upgrade from companies the likes of Aurender, Grimm, Antipodes, et al.

One thing no one has mentioned is that the MU1 has its own iteration of ROON built into it. This was done to optimize communications and improve SQ. This was with knowledge and approval of ROON (it's ROON certified). This may address some of those critical of ROON SQ. 

I'm using the Grimm MU1 in front of a Mola Tambaqui, which has it's own streamer built-in, and the difference is incredible. With the Mola's selectable output voltage I can run my amps directly, but I still prefer running thru my ARC Ref 6 which provides a superior stage experience to my ears. 

BTW, having ROON built in saves many people the cost of a $1500. ROON Nucleus.